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Grammy-award winning Hip-Hop and R&B artist Lauryn Hill recently took to her Instagram account to pay tribute to Roberta Flack. Flack passed away at the age of 88, per a report by AP on Monday afternoon. Hill, known for her rendition of Flack's song “Killing Me Softly”, shared her thoughts on her passing.
In her Instagram post, she shared several photos of Flack, along with a few showing Hill and Flack together, and wrote:
“Whitney Houston once said to me that Roberta Flack’s voice was one of the purest voices she’d ever heard. I grew up scouring the records my Parents collected. Mrs. Flack was one of their favorites and quite instantly became one of mine as soon as I was exposed to her. She looked cool and intelligent, gentle and yet militant.
The songs she recorded from ‘Compared To What’ to ‘The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face’ to her version of ‘Ballad Of The Sad Young Men’ fascinated me with their beauty and sophistication. Mrs. Flack was an artist, a singer-songwriter, a pianist and composer who moved me and showed me through her own creative choices and standards what else was possible within the idiom of Soul.
Killing Me Softly, a song Mrs. Flack didn’t write, but made hugely popular became the song that catapulted myself and the Fugees into household phenomena. We wanted to honor the beauty and brilliance of this song and her performance of it to our generation. I will forever be grateful for the sensitivity and delicate power of her Love and Artistry. Rest in Grace Beloved One.”
Roberta Flack created a lasting HBCU legacy during her time at Howard University. Born in Black Mountain, North Carolina, in 1937, Flack demonstrated exceptional musical talent from a young age. At just 15, she was awarded a music scholarship to Howard University, a remarkable feat that made her one of the youngest students in the institution's history.
Per comments in a 2010 feature done on Flack by NBC Washington, Flack learned to play piano before even learning how to read. Her skills helped her as she gained admission into one of the most prestigious universities in the country. She began her studies as a piano major but later shifted her focus to voice, eventually becoming an assistant conductor for the university choir, where her talents continued to shine. Her leadership and direction of the production of Aida earned a standing ovation from the Howard University faculty.
Within a year, she was conducting the Delta Sigma Theta vocal quartet, accompanying pop, jazz, and opera singers, and assisting the university’s choir conductor. During this time, she officially changed her major from piano to voice. To make extra money, she taught private piano lessons and played the organ at her parent’s church, taking over a role previously held by her mother, per a feature on her life by PBS. Before graduating, she changed her major again to music education as she moved to start her teaching journey.
After graduating from Howard University at just 19, she began graduate studies in music. However, her father’s sudden death forced her to leave school and take a teaching job to support herself. She taught music and English in Farmville, North Carolina, continuing her teaching career, and also gained experience as a student teacher at a school near Chevy Chase, Maryland.
